Journal of Geek Studies

Monster Hunter: an evolutionary story Christopher Sevin Independent scientific educator, France. Email: c-sevin (at) live (dot) fr Download PDF Monster Hunter is a fantasy-themed video game franchise created by the Japanese company Cap…

New article alert! 🚨
An evolutionary take on the fauna of one of gaming’s most loved worlds!
Read more: jgeekstudies.org/2026/02/05/m...

#GeekStudies #MonsterHunter #scicomm #systematics

Analysis of Eirin Yagokoro (Touhou Project) from a bioethical perspective I Gede Eka Agung Agastya Punia Department of Medical Education, Faculty of Medicine, Mahasaraswati University, Bali, Indonesia. Email: agastya (at) unmas (dot) ac (dot) id  Download PDF Bioethics i…

🚨New article!
Bioethics in #Touhou? @venti-tempest.bsky.social looks into how Eirin Yagokoro fares in terms of medical ethics in her practice.

#GeekStudies #GameStudies #TouhouProject #東方 #東方Project

Perfect

Study explores wellbeing impact of board games Researchers find games such as Dungeons and Dragons and Dixit can lead to a boost in confidence.

"Researchers are exploring the ways board games and tabletop role-playing games could be used in health and social care interventions."

#rpg #dnd #mentalhealth

Please do not feed the trolls! The graphic has been roaming around the internet for about a decade now, and I found several iterations of it, but I could not locate the original artist. This one I took from a piece by Dan Wunderlich on How to respond to trolls, haters, and honest feedback on Facebook (https://www.resourceumc.org/en/content/how-to-respond-when-negativity-hits-your-facebook-page)

Why do some people elect to be trolls? Part of it is attention seeking, but there is a dark undercurrent of traits sending them down that path, including narcissism, trait sadism, and even straight-up psychopathy, all found to be strong predictors for such behavior. 🧪

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Here's an interview with Video Game History Foundation's Frank, where we talk about their Sega Channel finds, the NES's launch and lots of other stuff. Just search any podcast app for "RetroRGB Cifaldi", or check out the main post here: https://retrorgb.com/interview-with-vghfs-frank-cifaldi.html

The lure of the deep sea: anglerfish as movie monsters Prema Arasu & Alan J. Jamieson Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research Centre, The University of Western Australia. Emails: prema.arasu (at) uwa (dot) edu (dot) au; alan.j.jamieson (at) uwa (dot) edu (d…

The anglerfish article spiked in traffic after a real anglerfish was spotted in the wild and hit the news earlier this year. Geek timing is wild sometimes 😉

The Astolfo Effect: the popularity of Fate/Grand Order characters in comparison to their real counterparts João Vitor Tomotani¹ & Rodrigo Brincalepe Salvador² ¹ Independent Researcher. São Paulo, SP, Brazil. ² Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Wellington, New Zealand. Emails: tjvitor (at) gma…

All‑time leaderboard update!
🥇 Astolfo Effect
🥈 Pokémollusca
🥉 Medjed
These three articles are officially the most accessed in JGS history.

Wilted lands and wounded worlds: visualizing environmental costs of war in Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind Audrey Aguirre Upland High School, Upland, CA, USA. Email: audrey.a.aguirre (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Past studies on Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (風の谷のナウシカ; Topcraft, 1984) have prim…

Huge kudos to Audrey Aguirre!
Her Nausicaä article topped our charts as the most‑read piece of 2025, and she’s the youngest author ever to write for the JGS.

Our most accessed #geekstudies articles in 2025 were:

1. Visualizing environmental costs of war in Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind
2. Pokémollusca: mollusk-inspired Pokémon
3. Anglerfish as movie monsters
4. The Astolfo Effect
5. Medjed: from Ancient Egypt to Japan

Read them at jgeekstudies.org

Top 10 countries with the most accesses to the JGS in 2025: USA, UK, Canada, Brazil, Germany, Australia, France, India, Japan, China.

Our 2025 Year in Review!

Readers from 185 countries/territories visited the Journal of Geek Studies this year. We appreciate your support! 🤗

Top 10: USA, UK, Canada, Brazil, Germany, Australia, France, India, Japan, China.
🎉 And for the first time, Montserrat and Côte d’Ivoire joined the party!

Ma dernière étude est désormais disponible dans le dernier volume du JGS ! J'y parle pour rappel Conservation animale par le jeu vidéo, ses difficultés, ses enjeux, et ses perspectives !! 🦉

Botany Manor: a cozy game unveiling the inequalities in academia Interview with Laure De Mey and Kitt Byrne Download PDF Botany Manor is a multiplatform game developed by the English indie studio Balloon Studios and published by Whitethorn Games. Initially relea…

Interview with @lauredm.bsky.social & @kittbyrne.bsky.social
"#BotanyManor: a cozy game unveiling the inequalities in academia"

The Blood on Our Controllers: how the game industry relates to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict Interview with Hippolyte Caubet Download PDF As we all know, this conflict began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led armed groups launched a surprise attack on Israel, killing over a thousand people…

Interview with @hippolyte.bsky.social
"The Blood on Our Controllers: how the game industry relates to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict"

Wilted lands and wounded worlds: visualizing environmental costs of war in Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind Audrey Aguirre Upland High School, Upland, CA, USA. Email: audrey.a.aguirre (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Past studies on Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (風の谷のナウシカ; Topcraft, 1984) have prim…

"Wilted lands and wounded worlds: visualizing environmental costs of war in Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind"
By A. Aguirre

#AnimeStudies #アニメ研究 #StudioGhibli #スタジオジブリ

Pokérus: unraveling the biology of the Pokémon virus Abraham U. Morales-Primo Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional, Autónoma de México, Hospital General de México, Mexico City, Mexico. Email: aump.puma (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Since th…

"Pokérus: unraveling the biology of the #Pokémon virus"
By @aumpuma.bsky.social

#immunology #virology

Archaeolinguistics and language deciphering in action-adventure video games: Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider and Uncharted Pier Simone Pischedda Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Societies, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK. E-mail: p.s.pischedda (at) leeds (dot) ac (dot) uk Download PDF Popular…

"Archaeolinguistics and language deciphering in action-adventure video games: #IndianaJones, #TombRaider and #Uncharted"
By @drpierpischedda.bsky.social

#archaeology #gamestudies

Is a bone a viable weapon when combating a Rancor? Estimating the bite force of an intergalactic mega-predator Stephan Lautenschlager1,2 & Thomas Clements3 1School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK. 2The Lapworth Museum of Geology, Birmingham, UK. 3…

"Is a bone a viable weapon when combating a Rancor? Estimating the bite force of an intergalactic mega-predator"
By @palaeostephan.bsky.social & @taphonomist.bsky.social

#StarWars #scifi #paleontology

Searching for individuality: personality and behaviour of Thompson and Thomson Olivia Le Moëne Independent researcher. Uppsala, Sweden. Email: olivia.lemoene (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Download PDF (French) Hergé’s Tintin comic books are a classic of graphic literature…

"Searching for individuality: personality and behaviour of Thompson and Thomson"
By O. Le Moëne

Vol. 12(1): June, 2025 Journal of Geek Studies –Vol. 12(1): published on June 26, 2025 The Blood on Our Controllers: how the game industry relates to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict Interview with H. Caubet Pp. 1-5.  PD…

It’s officially ‘year in review’ season! Revisit our first 2025 issue and explore all the #geekstudies articles and interviews with game devs.

Don't forget to check out our recent contribution to the journal where @palaeostephan.bsky.social and I worked out the bite force of the Rancor from Star Wars!

jgeekstudies.org/2025/03/08/i...

Steampunk dinosaurs and Victorian-era palaeontology Rodrigo B. Salvador1 & Barbara M. Tomotani1,2 1Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland. 2Department of Arctic and Marine Biology, UiT – The Arctic Universit…

"Steampunk dinosaurs and Victorian-era palaeontology"
By @krakenscholar.bsky.social & @babimt.bsky.social

Can conservation really be effective through video games? A case study on Jack Barau and some perspectives Florian Verdier Independent Researcher, Sens, France. Email: fverdier.ei (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Almost half of the world’s population plays video games (Buijisman, 2024). Whether the exp…

"Can conservation really be effective through video games? A case study on Jack Barau and some perspectives"
By @floriannechekuv.bsky.social

When trash stops being a treasure: pollution and its effects in Another Crab’s Treasure Abraham U. Morales-Primo Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Hospital General de México, Mexico City, Mexico. E-mail: aump.puma (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Marine e…

"When trash stops being a treasure: pollution and its effects in Another Crab’s Treasure"
By @aumpuma.bsky.social

"When cyberpunk leaks into the timeline: megacorps, memes, and Rheinmetall as a real‑world case study"
By J. Hepper

Molluscs of the Multiverse: molluscan diversity in Magic: The Gathering Rodrigo B. Salvador1, Natan C. Pedro2, Mark A. Carnall3 1Zoology Unit, Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland. 2Museu de Zoologia da Universidade de São Paulo,…

"Molluscs of the Multiverse: molluscan diversity in Magic: The Gathering"
By @krakenscholar.bsky.social, N.C. Pedro & M. Carnall

Predicting competitive Pokémon VGC leads using Latent Semantic Analysis: a data-driven approach to team matchups Bruno Luvizotto Carli Universidade Federal do Paraná, Curitiba, PR, Brazil. brunolcarli (at) gmail (dot) com Download PDF Competitive Pokémon battles often hinge on the initial selection of Pokémon…

"Predicting competitive Pokémon VGC leads using Latent Semantic Analysis: a data-driven approach to team matchups"
By @beelzebruno.bsky.social

We're approaching the year's end, so our 2025 volume is now closed. 🎉
You can check it out at jgeekstudies.org/archives/vol...
We have #geekstudies articles about Pokémon tournaments, Magic molluscs, cyberpunk, Another Crab's Treasure, conservation & video games, and steampunk dinosaurs in anime.

Ma dernière étude sur la conservation animale par le jeu vidéo est sorti mi-novembre, où j'essaie de baliser ce qui se fait et ce qui pourrait être fait dans un futur proche.

Si vous êtes chercheur ou journaliste dans le JV et que le sujet vous intrigue, n'hésitez pas à venir m'en parler ^^

Steampunk dinosaurs and Victorian-era palaeontology Rodrigo B. Salvador1 & Barbara M. Tomotani1,2 1Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland. 2Department of Arctic and Marine Biology, UiT – The Arctic Universit…

We have a new article! 🎉
Steampunk dinosaurs and Victorian-era palaeontology ⚙️🦖

@krakenscholar.bsky.social and @babimt.bsky.social discuss Iguanodon, from its discovery to modern-day interpretations.
#GeekStudies #ScienceHistory #GeekCulture #anime #PrincessPrincipal

👉 Read it here: